Fine.
If he wanted his halls to feel like a ship, neat and stripped down to use, then he could live with a reminder that he had married a human being and not the parts of a ship that followed orders to the strictest letter.
She released a loud breath and went to the linen room.
The maid inside jumped at the sight of her. “Me Lady?”
“I need a tapestry,” Emma declared, her voice louder than she had intended. “For the Laird’s chamber.”
The maid’s eyes went wide. That helped more than if she had simply responded with words.
Emma walked to where she gestured and began to sort through folded cloth and rolled hangings that smelled of cedar and dust. The designs were all rather predictable and boring. She flipped through each one, groaning in exasperation whenever another one appeared. Hunts. Stags and spears. Knotwork in dull wool.
Is there anything here that is mildly interesting?
She was about to give up when she found what she was looking for at the back, almost hidden.
It was a tapestry of a lamb, a fawn, and a fox with ears too large for its head. On it were also lilac and pale green flowers that would look completely odd against the stone walls.
It looked like something a grandmother would hang over a cradle and never take down again.
“Perfect,” she murmured. “This one. I would like to hang this one in the Laird’s chambers.”
“For… his chamber, me Lady?” the maid stuttered.
“Yes.” Emma gathered the roll into her arms. “Bring nails and a hammer upstairs.”
With the most perfect smile on her face, she walked out of the room. It was as if this were a simple task, like tidying a room, not carrying a banner into enemy territory.
In Logan’s chamber, she chose the wall opposite the bed where his eyes would land whenever he woke and whenever he tried to forget.
The maid passed her the hammer and nails. Emma climbed onto a small chair and fixed the top edge to the stone, teeth clenched, arms straining a little beneath the weight. When she stepped down, she took a long look at her handiwork.
Against the dark wall, the tapestry looked absurd. Soft wool animals and shy flowers staring over a laird’s bed.
Ridiculous.
And that was the point.
“Good,” she muttered under her breath. “Now stare at your lambs while you scowl, my fierce Laird.”
Was it petty? Yes.
Childish? Likely.
But this was entirely hers, and for once she did not apologize for it, even in her own head.
She left, intending to fetch the cat and place it somewhere that would bother Logan and that he could not erase with an order. The hallway, however, lay empty. The little corner by her door, where the cat liked to nap, held only dust.
“Lord Whiskerfield?” she called, annoyed at herself for using the silly name she had given the cat in the first place. Why would he know what that meant? “Where are you?”
No response came.
Her temper spiked far faster than her sense said it should.
The cat had been the start of her foolish little kingdom. She had bargained for it like a treaty. The men might haul her calf outside, might drag her goat back to the pen, but they would not take her cat.
She checked the next hallway, then the shadowed corner by the stairwell, calling a little louder each time. But no answer came. Only the faint clatter of pots from below and the low murmur of voices.
